Doubt
by MsAdler583
Summary: A closer look at two scenes that define the Man of Faith and the Man of Science. Taken from "Orientation" and "Live Together Die Alone"


A/N: Rewatching LOST (of course) and had this idea about the contrast between these two scenes. An interesting look at the push and pull of Jack and Locke. Don't own LOST and the dialogue is taken from the show.

Jack made his way down into the hatch, his throat burning from the clench of tears and anger. He wondered if Sayid was able to get the computer fixed. It bothered him how much he needed to know. As he approached he heard Locke reading the numbers out to the others, crowded around the computer. Locke was wrong. It wasn't 32, it was 42.

"It's not 32. It's 42. He just told me, Desmond. The last number's 42."

The others turned to look at him. Jack looked at Kate who looked more confused than ever. It seemed too much in that moment; taking care of the others, worrying about them every day and now they had a doomsday computer to mess with. Angrily, Jack walked away.

"You do it, Jack."

Locke's command made Jack stop in his tracks. If John wanted to waste all his time pushing the button then fine, but Jack sure wasn't going to waste any more time on it.

"What?"

"You have to do it."

Jack fought the urge to laugh. He didn't _have _to do anything. "You do it yourself, John."

"You saw the film, this is a two person job at least."

Jack looked at Locke's face and couldn't believe the earnest plea he saw there. Only then did he realize Locke actually believed it all. He believed the island required Boone as a sacrifice, that all roads led to the hatch and that this was their destiny. Jack just couldn't accept that.

"This argument is irrelevant." Sayid mumbled and moved towards the computer.

"Sayid, don't." Jack cried. John wasn't going to pull anyone into his circle of crazy.

"Jack."

"Don't. It's not real." Jack knew it. He knew it couldn't be real. None of this was real. "Look, you want to push the button, you do it yourself."

"If it's not real, then what are you doing here, Jack? Why did you come back?"

Jack scoffed at the question and thought about the last ten minutes in the jungle. He remembered clearly Desmond's face when Jack told him nothing was going to happen. As he yelled it, he didn't know if he was telling Desmond, or himself.

"In fifty minutes you're either going to be very right or very wrong, brother." Desmond looked to Jack.

Jack wondered if secretly Desmond didn't want him to push the button. Maybe, Desmond wanted to find out what was going to happen if they didn't.

"Why are you running?" Jack cried, "You don't even know what you're running from!"

Jack saw the light come on in Desmond's eyes as he recalled how they met in Los Angeles. Jack's heart crumpled as he realized exactly what it was he was running from.

"See ya in another life, ya?"

Back in the hatch, the timer had run down to a minute. Jack was going to have to make a decision. All this time he had been making decisions and tried his hardest to make the right one. Now, this one could end up killing them all if he was wrong. He wanted to believe, he wanted so bad to believe. But after all, Locke had said it best, he was a man of science, not a man of faith.

"Why do you find it so hard to believe?"

"Why do you find it so easy?"

"It's never been easy!"

Jack stepped back as he the echo of Locke's cry rang out with the alarm. Had it really never been easy for Locke? It seemed easy enough when he had killed Boone, or believed that falling into a pit of black smoke would save him. It even seemed easy when he lit the dynamite while Hurley yelled from the sidelines. But Jack? He struggled with the idea of knowing he was never going to bury his father. He couldn't give up when Charlie was sprawled unconscious in the jungle. And he couldn't control his own emotions as he watched Boone slowly die. For Jack, it had never been easy.

"Maybe you should just do it." Kate's voice wafted into this thoughts.

Firm in his stance, Jack shook his head, "No. It's a button."

"I can't do this alone, Jack. I don't want to. It's a leap of faith, Jack."

Jack looked at the clock. _Leap of faith_. The timer had ran down to thirty seconds and was falling. _A leap of faith_. When the alarm got to ten seconds, Jack looked to Locke whose pleading face had grown more serious than he had ever seen him. Jack hesitated. If he pushed it, that would be it, he knew. Jack knew that if they pushed the button this first time it would never end. He and Locke would be pushing the button until the end. _It's a leap of faith_. Staring down John, Jack moved forward and pushed the button. Defeated, he walked away, wondering if his leap of faith had just saved the world.

Locke watched the door closely, knowing that it would keep Eko out, no matter what. Desmond continued to pour over the print out from the Pearl station. Finally he spoke up, "We need to push the button,"

Locke nearly laughed, "No, we don't."

"Did you not hear me brother? I crashed your bloody plane."

Locke listened as Desmond explained the print out to mean the day he didn't push the button and the day the world almost ended. Locke didn't know how else to explain to Desmond that he had seen the film from the other hatch and knew that none of it was real. "It's real, it's all bloody real! Now push the damn button!" Desmond yelled.

"I know what I saw! It's a lie; it's not real. None of it is real!" Locke cried, knowing it was true. None of it was real. It had taken him this long to realize it, but he finally knew. It had never been real. Locke didn't see it then, but the night he had beaten his hand bloody and saw the light hadn't been real. The dream that led him to the place where Boone died hadn't been real. Even landing on the island so that he could be healed hadn't been real. None of it was real.

He thought back to the afternoon in the Pearl station with Eko. After watching the orientation video he sat at the table and watched Eko pack the printout into his backpack.

"What are you doing?" Locke asked.

"I'm taking this back with us."

"Why?"

"Because they may be important."

Locke couldn't stop the little sigh, "Important? I'm sorry, weren't you just watching the same thing I was?"

"Yes, John. And I believe the work you have been doing is more important than ever."

"What work?" Locke couldn't believe his ears. Surely Eko really didn't think that all of it was about saving the world. He had been fooled before but finally he saw the truth.

"Pushing the button."

John laughed this time, "That's not work. That's a joke. Rats in a maze, with no cheese."

"It is work, John. We are being tested."

"Tested?" John saw the reality in Eko's eyes and knew that he so blindly believed all of this.

"The reason to do it, push the button is not because we are told to do so in a film."

"Well then what is the reason, Mr. Eko?"

"We do it because we believe we are meant to do so. Isn't that the reason you pushed it, John?"

"I was never meant to do anything! Every single second of my pathetic little life is as useless as that button! You think it's important, you think it's necessary? It's meaningless. And who are you to tell me it's not?"

Locke looked to Desmond and saw the pure desperation on his face. He knew that he really believed pushing the button would save the world.

"You don't want to push the button, brother? Then I will."

"No!" John leapt over to grab the monitor and hurl it to the ground. He had to stop the cycle of believing the lies. He had to show them that their faith wasn't in the right place. They believed it all for nothing. Locke knew it, he knew it more than he had ever known anything before. He looked down at the smashed screen and felt a small sense of relief knowing he was no longer a slave to the button.

"You've killed us. You've killed us all."

"No. I've saved us all." Locke realized that he had saved the world more than pushing the button had ever done. As Desmond made the cables spark and ran out into the other room, Locke could hear Charlie calling for help with Eko. Locke turned up to look at the clock and saw it click to thirty seconds. In thirty seconds he would finally find out if he was wrong, or right. As Desmond ran back in the room, he pushed aside a tool box. Locke moved over to see what he was doing.

"Three days before you came down here, before we met, I heard a banging on the hatch door. Shouting. But it was you John, wasn't it? You say there isn't any purpose there's no such thing as fate. But you saved my life, brother, so that I could save yours."

"No, no, no." Locke grabbed Desmond's shoulders and struggled to keep him from going down there and doing whatever it was he was going to do. "None of this is real. Nothing is going to happen. We're going to be okay."

Locke followed Desmond's hurried glance at the clock that had beeped down to six seconds.

"I'm sorry for whatever happened that made you stop believing. But it's all real. And now I've got to make it all go away."

A sliver of doubt began to creep into Locke's mind. _Stop believing._ "Wait, Desmond."

"I'll see ya in another life, brother."

Locke watched Desmond disappear down into the darkness below the hatch. _Stop believing. _The hieroglyphics appeared and the computer system began warning of a system failure. Locke looked around at the hatch and for once, began to wonder if maybe it was all real. He wanted so bad for it to be real. _Stop believing._ Defeated, Locke stood there, realizing that he had just doomed the world.


End file.
